


Life Itself

by pomblossom (apricari)



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Blood, Canon typical character death, Character Study, Gen, M/M, post-game spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:34:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27430582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apricari/pseuds/pomblossom
Summary: “I’m hardly a god,” said Zagreus. He turned his cup before taking a drink. “Let alone the god of anything. I bleed like a mortal. I can’t bestow blessings like my relatives can, I have no cult. I’m just the son of the god of the dead. The prince. That’s all.”
Relationships: Achilles & Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Thanatos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 601





	Life Itself

“I’m hardly a god,” said Zagreus. He turned his cup before taking a drink. “Let alone the god of anything. I bleed like a mortal. I can’t bestow blessings like my relatives can, I have no cult. I’m just the son of the god of the dead. The prince. That’s all.”

“And the son of the goddess of vegetation,” Achilles reminded him. The noise of the lounge nearly drowned his voice. “Life that grows from the earth. And half mortal herself. If the intersection of the organic living and the dead is not the blood which runs through mortal veins, what is?” Zagreus frowned, and a hesitant look came over Achilles. “I apologize if I’ve spoken out of line—“

“No, Achilles, it’s all right. I just, well...find it strange to consider.”

“Consider it or not at all if you’d like,” said Achilles gently. “I was only giving voice to my thoughts on your relationship with Master Thanatos.”

“And I value your thoughts, Achilles, thank you,” said Zagreus, but he walked away from the conversation feeling rather unmoored.

-

During one escape attempt, he stayed longer in Eurydice’s corner of Asphodel, listening to her sing as she cooked a fresh batch of pom porridge.

“Eurydice? This is for you.” He offered her a bottle of nectar. “Thank you for your hospitality and for the delicious food. You’re always so welcoming, I look forward to running into you when I’m passing through here.”

“That’s really sweet of you, hon.” She opened the bottle, holding it up to the candlelight. “Really good stuff too. Sit tight and I’ll add some to your treat here. And thanks for the blessing, Your Royal Majesty.”

Zagreus stared. “I’m sorry?”

“The nectar.”

“I mean—what did you call it?”

“A blessing. Gifting me like this.”

Zagreus watched her measure out a spoonful. “I...never thought of it that way.”

“As a blessing? That’s what it is, isn’t it?” She added the nectar to the pot. “Gods giving us mortals gifts? Sounds like a blessing to me.”

-

Zagreus leaned heavily on Stygius at the end of a brutal match against Theseus and Asterius. Cheers and applause in reaction to an impressive, bloody fight echoed around the arena. 

He looked up and happened to find the single orange-clothed shade in the crowd, who shyly waved. The shade was there every time Zagreus battled in the arena, without fail. His own words echoed in his head. A fan isn’t a cult, he thought. But one was there.

He laughed at himself and waved wildly overhead before stumbling through the exit to drink from the fountain beyond, nearly forgetting his prize ambrosia on the way.

-

Crouched in the snow, Zagreus’ vision blurred. He wouldn’t be able to make it far past the threshold before his wounds got to him. He’d have to apologize again to his mother for not being able to make it to her cottage. He hoped the lavender bushes weren’t getting too much light.

He had nearly lost this fight. Father had been ruthless as usual, and Zagreus had walked into the fight still wounded from his trips through the satyr tunnels. He did not know how he had won the fight, if Apollo would have him be truthful. Another one to chalk up to the Fates.

He breathed hard for another minute. The red blood from his wounds was stark against the white snow. It melted the tiny crystals.

So much of the stuff. He wondered if mortals can all bleed so much before they die. Maybe Than would know. He pressed his hand against the wound in his side and groaned and laughed from the shock. They must all feel as much pain too.

He made it past the pillars and a few steps up the little hill, past the pond before he collapsed in the snow. When he opened his eyes, he was floating in a pool of red.

-

“What’s this?”

Zagreus lifted his head to see Thanatos picking up the codex from where Zagreus had set it next to his bed.

“Achilles’ codex,” said Zagreus sleepily. “He gave it to me so I could fill it out on my sprints to the surface. I like it, don’t you?”

Than silently flipped through the entries, Zagreus could see out of the corner of his eye; his father, Hypnos, Nyx, Cerberus, Charon.

“There’s one on everyone in here.”

“Mm.” Zagreus closed his eyes, and when he opened them again Thanatos was reading the entry about himself.

“Didn’t strike me as the vain type.”

“Shut it,” Than said absently. “Achilles calls you the god of blood.”

“Did he?” Zagreus said coyly. He kissed the hollow of Thanatos’ throat.

“Of life.”

“I die all the time.”

“You come back every time.”

“So I’m immortal. Every other god is.”

“You’re warm,” said Thanatos.

Zagreus considered in silence. He could tell Than was thinking, too. “I have my mother’s blood,” said Zagreus finally. “I don’t know that makes me the god of it.”

He traced soothing circles on Than’s cool chest. After some time, Thanatos sighed.

“Well, he says I adore you.” He set the codex aside and turned his face into Zagreus’ hair. “He’s right about that.”

-

Datura were always in full bloom in the Underworld. Bushes of them lined the walls of the House’s garden. Zagreus liked them the best of all the flowers there, and how he had spied them shrinking when his mother had first entered the garden and how now their blossoms looked like white fountains.

“That’s what Achilles wrote, anyway,” said Zagreus.

“And what do you think of it, child?” Said Nyx.

“I don’t know. It’s strange to think I could be the god of anything, especially something so...mortal.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being part mortal, Zagreus,” said Persephone, as gently as Achilles had.

“It’s not that at all. I just mean...I haven’t ever met a living mortal. I didn’t know I was part mortal for so long. And if I’m supposed to be the god of mortal blood...Do you think he could be right? Achilles, I mean. I figured you both must know more than I could.”

Sideways from his spot laying down in the mossy grass, Nyx and Persephone looked at each other as if checking to see if the other would rather start. “It is up to the Fates, child,” Nyx said. “Zeus was not the god of the heavens nor your father the god of the dead until after the Fates decided.”

“Isn’t this the sort of thing I would just...know, if it were true?”

When he sat up, his mother smiled. “Perhaps this is you on your way to finding out.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is more a character study about Zagreus than it is anything else. I found myself thinking a lot about that last line of Than’s entry in the codex and this is what came of it.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
